My brain hurts
By Tom Durkin
I’m confused. Apparently, Nevada County is willing to let people live outside in the weather, but it’s illegal to let them live inside in safe alternative housing.
What am I missing here? It’s okay for people to sleep on the ground in the rain, snow, wind and cold. But it’s not okay for them to sleep on a bed in a trailer or RV (alternative housing) even if they’re safe and welcome on private property.
This makes no sense to me.
Safe and truly affordable housing is available all over the county, but it’s illegal to let people live on your property in an alternative dwelling unit on wheels. Never mind that thousands of people are doing it safely anyway.
That’s about to change. Nevada County is poised to legalize “tiny homes on wheels” (THOW) on private property – but not all homes on wheels (HOW). The proposed ordinance, which applies to the unincorporated areas of the county, is clearly designed to exclude RVs and trailers without expressly saying so.
This gives me a headache.
Follow me here. It’s a short journey. They’re all built to rigorous codes, regulations and laws. They’re all licensed by the California Department of Motor Vehicles.
People live in them. They’re all homes on wheels.
Why are tiny homes okay and the rest not?
A matter of class
I’ve heard two arguments as to why. I don’t buy either of them.
The closet NIMBY (not in my back yard) reasoning is that THOW are “residential” and “blend” into the community. Apparently, even the Dalai Lama living in a $100,00 Winnebago would be a blight on the neighborhood.
The real argument is that, “Tiny homes attract a better class of people,” according to one property owner.
Oh. So, it’s a class thing. I’m automatically low-class because I live in a trailer. And so is everybody else who decided to live in non-THOW homes on wheels because that’s all we could find or afford.
Now my brain really hurts.
I’m not opposed to legalizing THOW. It’s about time. As a stakeholder, I’m opposed to the proposed ordinance because it does not include all HOW.
This should come as no surprise to anybody at the county. I’ve been proposing this since 2019, and in the last 12 months, I’ve presented a PowerPoint to department heads and senior staff; submitted a position paper to the Board of Supervisors; had hour-long, one-on-one interviews with each of them; and despite a public-speaking inability, spoken at numerous meetings.
HELP!
Lots of people ask me how they can help with the Sierra Roots/No Place to Go Project. Here’s how you can help:
We need people to sign our HOW petition to amend the THOW ordinance.
If you really want to help, submit written comments in support of HOW to Senior Planner Kyle.Smith@nevadacountyca.gov by 5 p.m. Sept. 5.
Last week, I was on KVMR three times, once on YubaNet, and twice in The Union (including the front page last Friday), not to mention multiple Facebook posts and emails … and as of this writing, we only have 103 signatures.
What makes my brain bleed almost as much as my heart is that people are “liking” the Facebook posts, but actually helping by signing a petition seems to be a footbridge too far.
We have a homeless crisis because of a housing shortage. There is absolutely no good or decent reason to exclude people from having a legal home in a trailer, RV or mobile home.
HOW housing is what’s keeping some people from experiencing homelessness, and it’s the first step out of experiencing homelessness for others.
Please, sign the petition. It’s not okay for people to be living outside when legal, affordable housing could be made available by the stroke of a pen.
Carrying on
Tomorrow, Aug. 30, is the last day of the Upstate California Creative Corps grant that financed the Sierra Roots/No Place to Go Project. The end of the grant, however, is not the end of the mission. I’m proud to say Sierra Roots is keeping me on part-time.
Ongoing medical complications – and giving myself too much work to do in the first place – kept me from completing all the things I promised in the grant application, even with a two-month extension. We’ve shot the videos, but editing is going to take some more time, as is the challenge to the proposed THOW ordinance.
The end of the grant is not the end of my gratitude to the Nevada County Arts Council – especially Eliza Tudor, Donn Harris, Jon Blinder, Diana Arbex and Michaelyn Logue.
I am also grateful to Nevada County Supervisor Ed Scofield and Don Rogers, former publisher of The Union, who put their faith in me.
Singer-songwriters Juliet Gobert and Bob Woods, Nevada City’s impresario Paul Emery, and my very able assistant Dianna Marie Hill made it a special year.
Finally, great gratitude to my dear colleagues at Sierra Roots, Kathy Ferguson, Susan Rice and Diane Weichel. Quite literally, I couldn’t have survived the Upstate grant without you. I’m looking forward to continuing to work with you.
Tom Durkin is the creative director of the Sierra Roots/No Place to Go Project, which is funded by the Upstate California Creative Corps and the Nevada County Arts Council. He may be contacted at tomdurkin@sierra-roots.org, www.noplacetogoproject.com or 530-559-3199.